In January 2016 Microsoft released a new version of StorSimple, that’s a virtual device that can be deployed on-premises. This is commonly referred to as OVA (On-premises Virtual Array). The online documentation lists its features and installation/management instructions.

Create StorSimple Manager service

At this time (22 January, 2016) we have 2 ‘flavors’ of the StorSimple Manager service in Azure:

Physical Device Series: This is the traditional StorSimple Manager service that is used to manage physical devices models 8100 and 8600 and the virtual devices models 8010 (formerly 1100) and 8020

Virtual Device Series: This is the new StorSimple Manager service that’s used to manage the new On-Premises Virtual Array (OVA)

A StorSimple Manager service of the latter ‘flavor’ can be created in the Azure Management Interface by selecting the ‘Virtual Device Series’ option:

The OVA is in early ‘Preview’ release as of 26 January 2016, and many expected features are not available yet. For example, the Virtual Device Series StorSimple Manager service appears to be currently available only in East and West Japan regions!?

I recommend not checking the box to ‘Create a new Azure Storage Account’ here, and to manually create a storage account. I recommend creating a Storage account that’s physically closest to where the OVA will run to achieve lowest WAN latency. I also recommend using Geo-redundant storage.

In January 2016 Microsoft released software update 2.0 for StorSimple cloud integrated storage arrays. The release notes list some interesting features such as Local Volumes, SVA (StorSimple Virtual Array) model 8020 that provides 64TB capacity and uses Premium Storage (SSD). In the next few posts I will examine each of the new features in v2.0 including:

In some situations you may need to factory reset your 8k series StorSimple hybrid storage array. There are a few things you should know before you proceed:

Offline the volume(s) in the file server(s) under Disk Management

Clean up Azure objects (the order here is important):
Offline and delete all volumes in the Azure classic portal. Delete volume containers. Delete backup policies (important). Delete associated Storage Account(s) if not used for any other purpose. In the Azure classic portal, deactivate the device

Prior to deactivating the device in the Azure Management Interface, the Get-HcsSystem cmdlet will show a display similar to:

Looking for ‘Normal’ on all 3: Controller 0 Status, Controller 1 Status, and System Mode. If not, factory reset will fail. This will need Microsoft support assistance to get the device back out of Recovery mode.

After deactivating the device in the Azure Management Interface, the Get-HcsSystem cmdlet will show a display similar to:

One issue we have now (12 January 2016) is that the device reverts back to the version it shipped with – that’s version 0.2, regardless of what version it was running prior to the factory reset. This means that after re-installation, the device needs to be updated to the latest version which takes several hours. updates may include Maintenance mode updates which require downtime and may need to be installed manually via the device serial console.

This can be seen in this image as well:

Notice that the device is on version 17584 (1.2) while the (source) VHD version is still 17361 (0.2). Part of the factory reset process is copying over the source VHD to the boot VHD; from which the device boots.